Stardust Global Ventures

Everybody is all up in arms over facebook places. Why? Confusion!

Let’s answer a couple of questions those of you who have never used location based services may have.

First of all if you’re using your computer, facebook places will not be told where you are or what you are doing. It doesn’t work that way.

Second, if you don’t use facebook on your phone you have no worries. Facebook places can’t possibly know with no input where you are or what you are doing.

Third, even if you do use facebook on your mobile device you still have to access the places tab and tell it where you are. For instance, when I am out and about in the world using facebook on my phone I have to open up the application and then manually open places and then type in where I am and it has to recognize that as a place or I have to tell it that where I am is the location of, for example, Lorenzo’s pizza. If I don’t tell it anything, it has no knowledge. GPS still has to be activated and linked with facebook in order for it to have any idea where you are.

The hype over facebook not being trusted is a whole other issue. I definitely understand there is little reason to trust facebook because they’ve certainly not done anything to garner trust. They’ve allowed your information to be public in spite of the steps you may believe you have taken to keep your privacy locked down. But location based services really are not smart. At least not right now. All of them, facebook included give you controls and you then set the privacy to whatever you choose. If you have facebook and don’t use it on your mobile device you have not one thing to fear. You don’t have to mess with your settings at all and it won’t matter one iota. You are as safe as you were before Places came to be.

EDIT: My friend Dameone Welch-Abernathy pointed out the one thing I forgot to mention. If you’re still really freaked out about all this, the one thing that guarantees you are not checked in is if you go to your settings and change other peoples ability to check you in where they are. Seriously though unless you have really skanky friends, they probably wouldn’t if they knew you didn’t want them too.

The old bait and switch.

This morning I was pointed to a link at Sysomos Blog . They ask the question, “Is Twitter really about lots of followers?” Fascinating since they don’t answer that question, they simply suppose it is, and explain how to make your twitter stream appealing to the masses.

Personally I vacillate a bit, but unless you are working for a company, building a company, trying to reach ‘the masses’, so to speak, I don’t happen to think attempting to reach millions of people and have a million+ followers on twitter is a goal. And, this article, while not totally off the mark, certainly begs the question ‘why’? Why is it important to be interesting enough to garner a bunch of new followers? Why does it matter at all how many followers you have?

Think for a minute about the Kevin Costner movie, Field of Dreams. If you build it, they will come, or if you tweet authentically people will follow – but it’s all about your goal, isn’t it? Does it matter for you if you don’t meet the industry ‘standard’ for number of followers? Why are we all expected to race toward a number that someone has set out there as important to reach, especially if we aren’t marketers. Or are we?

Are we marketers?

To be fair, all of us to a certain extent are marketers. We may not be marketing a big name product but we do market ourselves. The struggle, though, is that every second person on twitter is telling us how they have the answer to getting more followers, or some other ridiculous thing, and we get confused.

Let’s think about what really matters to us.

Are you a mouthpiece for a company, either your own or someone else’s? Is your goal to achieve a large audience so that your message is heard and possibly the reason someone makes a decision? If so then your numbers mean something different than the average person’s. Still, we need to remember there is a difference between broadcasting and engaging. This distinction is really getting muddied.

Dunbar’s Number

Well known anthropologist, Robin Dunbar theorized the number 150 as a mean number for processing ability in group size. The actual number will vary between 100 and 230, but 150 is what we can expect to be able to have in our network and still feel connection with. Others have posited this number is too low, with more recent numbers coming from a study of the US that suggests a mean of 230 with a high of 290.

Any way you slice it, there is a limit to cognition. These numbers are meant to provide explanation for how large a group can work in consort without conflict. In other words, there is a limit to the number of people we can positively impact.  There is no gaming the system, and there isn’t a great deal of difference in socio-economic/intelligence quotient.

What do you need to know?

Let’s assume you have a large network and it is necessary. What you need to know is that the larger your network, the less percentage of engagement there will be. As it grows you will become more like a megaphone and less like a conversationalist. The reciprocation will be lost and just as in the past with movie star idol worship, you will stop being a person and become a commodity. Own it, or get out of it but know what you’re getting when you go for those big counts. Don’t get me wrong, you will still have conversations but the actual numbers of people you will become personally involved with and stay personally involved with will diminish.

What’s your goal?

What you want may depend on what you’re doing. If you’re using twitter for business you have an entirely different goal than someone who is simply trying to stay connected. Understanding the difference is the key. Don’t be fooled. You are important and deserve a rich network full of people of your choosing. Whatever you do be considerate of those you connect with and keep your eye on the prize. The prize is what you want to gain from the involvement.

Sheryl wrote Of Weddings, Honeymoons and Authenticity, and described some of our life activity to perfection. Since moving to Walla Walla, real life and the priorities that come for us as a couple together have been a central part of our life. Her post made me think about something I’ve been considering for a while now too.

For friends and colleagues who’ve known me a while, you remember I oversaw the Realtime Unified Communications Community for four years. I’ve worked in the communications and networking industry for 30+ years, written several books and countless white papers and documents. I also produced hundreds of interviews, podcasts, videos and product evaluations. Some of you may wonder why you aren’t seeing that today. I thought I’d take a moment to explain.

First, my work with Realtime was a paid position that ended in December of 2008. It was a collaborative experiment with one of my publishers to explore how the Web 2.0 approach and social networking could be used by the publishing business. Realtime is quite successful and we have an ongoing great relationship. The business simply moved in another direction.

I’ve worked as both an employee and an independent contractor since 1980, balancing the challenges of both. Longtime friends know that I’ve focused on technical education, information security, and other networking concepts far beyond telecommunications, VoIP and unified communications. All of those interests remain, but today I focus heavily on enterprise architecture for global business.

Sure, I still consult with businesses of all sizes. I’m a big fan of local business and likely to do anything I can to help a business in my community flourish. That goes for my network too. My community isn’t confined to where I live. It includes my network online, which is quite global.

If I write about a business or product here, it isn’t just to write or keep fodder moving through the tubes. I don’t cut and paste press releases with a passing comment. Mostly, I delete them. They’re obsolete. I may write an occasional review of a product, service, book or some such because I’m interested and it caught my attention.

While I work entrenched in enterprise architecture (MPLS, QoS, Unified Communications, informatoin security architecture, network management, etc.), I don’t write a lot about that here. That work is focused, at the detail level, for my employer, CSC. When I talk about it here, I’ll be more focused on general trends, strategies, best practices and such. My highly technical focus is something that is paid for, and dedicated.

We’ll both always write about the things that excite us. We are after all geeks to the core. Mobile and wireless technologies – the elements of casual computing and hyperconnectivity are key elements of our life. They help simplify life, enabling us to focus on the things we hold dear.

I expect to write more personal things online. The things about our life, where we’re headed, things we’re doing that matter to us. I want to start writing more. I think this is a place where we both want to share ourselves in a complete and authentic way. Not just work, but as people.

As people, we’re focused on the human and humane aspects of networking. That means engaging with the people I’m connected to. It means sharing more than ideas and success stories or touting the latest hot technology. It means being human and real.

Like Sheryl said in her post, we want a future life on the beach. That’s going to take some time, work and planning. And I expect we’ll share our journey to get there. And then, our life from there.

Ken and I are married! Most of you probably assumed we already were, but we weren’t. Now we are.

We had a private ceremony at home overlooking the country club. Only family and closest friends in attendance. Ken had my son as his best man, and my pal JP from Quebec was my man of honor. Our photographer was my daughter and our videographer was my son’s girlfriend. All that was really left was to have my sister and the minister.  It was a wild and windy day, so while the ceremony was beautiful the wind wreaked havoc with decorations and wedding attire…mine! Still, it was special and wonderful and we were lucky to be blessed by a group of people who we love so very much to stand with us as we made the vows that mattered to us as well as the traditional and legal vows required by the state.

After our wedding we went off for our honeymoon. Our honeymoon was spectacular! We didn’t spend time online other than with our phones sharing pictures a bit. We focused on US and that is not something we do a lot. Oh, we have long talks and morning walks – quiet couple times but we always engage in some way with others. This was about us and I really appreciated the time to focus on our relationship and what matters for our life together.

We had such a great time wandering beaches, tidepools, small little towns and spending some time dreaming of a future on the beach in a more permanent way. It’s certainly not going to happen soon, but we came to the conclusion that as a couple our goal for later is to put together a plan that includes a life on the beach. We chose the beach as a honeymoon place because we both love it so much, but also because we both find so much calm and peace there.

Which brings me to the authenticity piece of this post. Lately I’ve noticed a lot of fickle behavior in the network. Not just my network but most networks. I want to set MY record straight so there isn’t any misunderstanding.

I follow some people who follow me, certainly not everyone. I choose to follow those who talk about things that are interesting to me. I don’t just arbitrarily follow people. I also don’t arbitrarily stop following people….except if they stop following me.

When someone stops following me I am forced to assess my stream. I admit that lately I’ve spent less time than typical tweeting and engaging. The above posting is probably a good example of why I’ve been a bit pulled away from my network. I was honoring others needs for privacy as well as our need to not be as over the top with our life happenings. We have always been really vocal about what we are doing and where we are. I felt compelled to be more private. Doing that created a problem for at least a few in my network. I’m sorry for that but I am not sorry why I was less engaged. My personal life must take precedence and for me it’s all in priorities.

Since moving to Walla Walla a year ago, I have been incredibly busy in my personal life. I have had to prioritize differently due to family needs etc. It was my son’s final year of high school. That all by itself has been a feat difficult to share. His life has been incredibly trying but this is the first year he hasn’t been undergoing treatments for his bone disorder. It has been a year full of watching and involvements. My last child is now an adult and headed to college. But as you can imagine, when you have a child with healthcare needs it’s never really finished and there are times when it is a bit overwhelming.

That’s the personal – but the not so personal, the stuff that feels personal even if it isn’t, is the part where people seem to just stop following and it correlates to a lack of involvement. I’m sorry if others don’t understand it but it’s also a testament to the fickleness that exists in this instant gratification world.

If you stop following me I will follow suit and stop following back. I don’t like that aspect of networking but if there isn’t reciprocity it seems pointless. I also would prefer to be involved in whatever way makes sense with people who understand my life isn’t all about making them happy. I’m more than what they see online. I have a full personal life that helps to make me who I am when I am online chattering away. I maintain a working relationship with individuals who may or may not be visible to the mainstream. I also have a private life that isn’t always shared.  I am authentic. If I share it’s something I find interesting or valuable. If I am quiet it’s because I am busy with something that must take precedence. It isn’t because I want to stop being involved with those in my network. I value everyone in my network. I follow them because of that. I stop following when the value is degraded somehow.

Thank you for all the good wishes on our recent marriage and if you’re still with me, thanks for your patience. Life is full of ups and downs and sometimes we have to step back and consider the value that we bring and pray others accept and understand we are human and evolving creatures. We can’t be all things to all people so good for you if you have decided I bring no value and turned me off for the betterment of your network. I am not offended, but I admit to thoughtfully considering why you have.

So to finish this post let me just  say Namaste! I wish you peace and prosperity, love and fulfillment.

Today is July 4th, 2010. Independence Day for those of you who are American or those who know anything about the history of the United States. Independence of what? Hm…that’s not really in debate, but this day and what it means has given me pause. Why? Because I’m about to embark on a new path that leaves me decidedly not independent, or does it? Let’s think about this.
Ken and I have been partnered for nearly 3 years. After these years of partnership we have finally decided to legalize ‘us’ as a couple. We have the marriage license, have a minister, our attendants/witnesses are ready to arrive for the big day. What about my 3 year long independence? Does a ceremony mean independence is no longer possible? Am I now to be absorbed or will I remain independent and a separate entity inside a partnership?  What is Independence?

Webster’s dictionary defines independence like this: 1 : the quality or state of being independent .

When you look up independent, here is what you get: 1 : not dependent: as a (1) : not subject to control by others : self-governing (2) : not affiliated with a larger controlling unit <an independent bookstore> b (1) : not requiring or relying on something else : not contingent <an independent conclusion> (2) : not looking to others for one’s opinions or for guidance in conduct

Independence means I have the right and ability to choose what I stand for, what I’d like to do and who I’d like to do it with. Independence means my opinions will still be my own, I will not have to give up what I believe or think for anyone else.

What independence doesn’t mean is that the past no longer exists or that we relinquish all of who we were prior. Nor does it mean we become whole only inside the marriage. It simply provides a point of reference for what we stand for. Isn’t that what independence day in America is? I stand for me, I support my family and I support my soon to be husband. I remain Independent.

Happy Independence Day, friends and colleagues.

We hope you will join us in thought: Thursday, July 22nd, 2010 at 4pm pdt as we celebrate our Independence as a couple. Media will follow. (We are the first couple in technology after all)

Just a quicky to consider the latest twitter bug as referenced on Mashable.

What do you think would happen if our numbers ceased to show, permanently? What would the so-called guru’s base their expertise on? Better yet, how would they set themselves apart? What would happen to the social media we have a love/hate relationship with?

I’d really love to find out. Hm….I wonder.

Just got through reading one of Robert Scoble’s opinion pieces on privacy. He makes some good points but more than that, it made me consider just what it is that most of us really mean when we talk about privacy. Have a look at his post and then let’s talk. http://scobleizer.com/2010/05/08/much-ado-about-privacy-on-facebook-are-we-protesting-too-much/

I don’t necessarily always agree with Robert but he definitely makes me think. I don’t think a locked down website is what most people want from Facebook. I know that’s not what I want. It is what everyone says they want, but maybe we should ask ourselves to really consider that. I think we want something else entirely.

You all know I’m female. Like it or not females are addressed by a certain segment of the world population differently than males are. While it doesn’t happen often, I have certainly had my share of requests for friendship by people who send a message telling me I’m ‘hot’ or asking for my IM so they can contact me directly. Usually they want me to use Yahoo, which sort of tells me something must be in yahoo I am not privy to because while I have a yahoo account for Flickr, I do not use yahoo.

So with these experiences, and a long term account on Facebook as well as a long term life online, it caused me to really think about what I would like on the web regarding privacy.

I want control of who has the ability to communicate with me. That’s all. I want people to treat their online neighbors as they would their next door neighbors and not expect they have the right to write derogatory things on their ‘walls’ or send mail that is inappropriate. I don’t want strange men or women to publicly hit on me, I do not want them to come to my place of business, ie email, linked in messages, blog, or wherever else i may be conducting business to ‘call me out’ like a high school bully. I expect to be treated on my public spaces the way I would were we in the same physical space. With dignity and respect. I think typing has emboldened us for some reason and I think we should step back and really consider when we all got the right to be mean and insensitive to one another.

I have recently had to block someone on Facebook. I blocked them because they were sending messages I don’t appreciate receiving. It’s not that I care if they see my profile, I only choose to not receive messages from them because they apparently struggle with the common courtesy I talked about above.

Since I’m writing this on my iPhone, I’ll end now. But think about it. Is it really privacy or simply some measure of control that has been missing from online life?

A while back Tom Foremski wrote a post called – Dirty Little Secrets: Social Media Is Terrible at Promoting Products.

I have thought about that and he’s right. Social media promotes social media, or to take it deeper, Social media is what companies use to promote themselves. But no one is successfully promoting a product with social media. What social media is doing is enabling communication.

Are Brands social? I don’t think so. We pay attention to brands because of cultivated credibility. People brands may be social, but typically by the time they reach recognizable brand status they are not nearly as social because they are too busy and bombarded, so people brands find the other people like them, and are social there. It no longer matters that they aren’t social because they have built enough credibility that WOM takes over and becomes all that matters. Even bad word of mouth rarely impacts them. Most treat that as sour grapes.

As a people brand grows, does social shifting happen where they no longer have to engage because the people who built and helped them now do all the ‘social’ for them? Is it asynchronous – where you, the brand, no longer have to be involved? I believe this to be the case.

Is the assumption that by having 100k + followers that you have then achieved such a state of brand identity you are no longer required to engage? How then do we maintain credibility? We don’t expect the products to jump off the market shelves at us as we walk through a store, why then should a people brand expect and get unconditional devotion? Do they now have whuffie, or karma to spare and other people perpetuate their brand for us?

I’d like to not confuse a Brand with Engagement. Engagement happens between people looking for something, be it friendship, products, or information, and those providing what we’re looking for. The best engagers are not the brands we already identify. Those brands have all become part of the old broadcast media mold. No, the best engagers are people who haven’t yet arrived. Hmmm, I wonder if that’s an argument for high turnover in social media? I think I’ll save that for another post.

Who of you have not heard some major brand tell you, “We listen and we respond”, only to ask a question and either get nothing in response, or get the canned response that they will respond as soon as possible but due to the massive number of requests it may take a while? Is this what we want from engagement? Can we even call this engagement? I think this is LAME!

What we want from engagement is a front facing contact, someone who is representative of the brand, not the brand, who will take the time to help us out. We don’t want someone identified as a brand because as soon as we identify a person as a brand, they have reached a status that defeats the purpose of the front facing person. A brand simply doesn’t have enough to give to that many people. Certainly not the engagement piece.

Brian Solis recently wrote the book, Engage: The complete guide for Brands and Businesses to Build, Cultivate, and Measure Success in the New Web. I haven’t personally read this book, in part because I have not had an opportunity, but there is another piece to it. I don’t think Brian engages well, except with those in his immediate universe, and I find it incredibly difficult to get excited enough to buy a book that is supposed to teach engagement from someone who is now his own brand. Certainly Brian is successful, you really can’t argue that, but why is he successful when he doesn’t eat his own dogfood? I believe Brian is successful because he has reached that brand status that many wish to reach, and yet so few ever truly achieve. But reaching that status now means he is incapable of being a person and truly engaging the way most social media people engage – which illustrates my point.

This isn’t a piece on Brian, and I’d rather not make it about him which is why I’m only linking to his book, not to him on a personal level. He is merely an example of the big picture I’m trying to paint, certainly not the only example, just a good one.

Once upon a time most Brands paid attention, asking questions about how they could do better, or what they should do differently, or even how to make your experience better. Once they get to the royalty stage, the only thing that shakes a brand up is a need to combat bad press, in other words the need to defend themselves.

You are certainly capable of making up your own mind about all this. I just had some thoughts, and where better to put them than here?

On a final note I’ll end with something I saw on twitter just moments before posting this. Practice what you preach, better yet, don’t preach. Just practice!

Makes sense, don’t you think? If you aren’t living it, walking the walk so to speak, at some point people will notice.

Technorati Tags: Tom Foremski, Sheryl Breuker, Brian Solis, Personal Brand, Engagement,

We’ve been keenly interested in the power of Location Based Services (LBS) for quite some time. Early on Jaiku provided some LBS functionality supported on Nokia phones via cell tower triangulation. Then the mighty Google purchased and all but kiled Jaiku. Brightkite provided an LBS a la Twitter interface that gave insight into why we might really want to use LBS, but has proven pretty user intensive, so the return on effort never led to adoption reaching critical mass.

Google introduced Latitude, which opened all sort of new potential. I wrote Giving Google a bit of Latitude on TheNextWeb back in February of 2009.

Today LBS is a hot topic, but it has a very limited adoption rate and user audience. While location baser services like Foursquare and Gowalla dominate conversation at events like SxSWi, the draw is first and foremost for mobile geeks in the tech sector and for tech-oriented events. We might observe that the greatest use of these tools today so that the Digerati/Twitterati web celebs (@Scobleizer and others in that visibility sphere) share their location so fawning hordes of fans can come touch the robes of the elite. That’s not the only use, but perhaps the biggest and most visible use today. There’s nothing monetizable in those egos, and there is no sustainability.

Secondarily, people in both business and technology are intrigued by the technology, using LBS tools to drive serendipity. The ability to share location in real-time can lead to chance meetings, for business and pleasure in a very personal and human way. Connecting with a client, colleague or friend by chance at a coffee shop, restaurant or Home Depot is a personal encounter. People buy from people, and this humanized and personalized connection through emerging tools builds a bond and forges a sort of alliance between people that we’re only beginning to appreciate.

Sheryl and I use these services extensively to check-in because we’re business and technology leaders in our community, and heavily engaged in the global tech sector. That means friends around the world know when we’ve checked in at Walla Walla Java Hut. For people in our community, they’ll also know that we’re friends of the owners, Brad and Cameo. They know we’re likely to be there chatting for a while and they can stop by to say hi, have coffee, ask a question. In short, we’ve made it easy for colleagues, clients and others to be in touch with us. We use LBS to lower the barrier to access.

This is a conscious choice, and for us carries a high value. We are social, and we value interaction and engagement. We’re also focused on our work, and use tools to leverage our strengths and our value. We think this is important.

That said, the tools of today are in their infancy. And the ones mentioned are not the only tools of today, or of next week. Google Latitude is still alive and well. Yelp provides an LBS oriented yellow pages like service that’s popular and widely used. Twitter has provided LBS information in the API for third-party developers for some time now. Recently they activated that feature on the Twitter web interface. Facebook will follow shortly with something bringing location into play.

Location may be the single most talked about piece of user metadata that exists today. The open discussion isn’t about location as metadata, but that’s where the value chain lies. That’s where the future is and where there’s money to be made, customers to be won, and influence to be leveraged.

What’s missing today for general adoption? The WIIFM quotient. What’s in it for me? Today, nothing. There is nothing in it for me, John or Jane Q. Public. As a member of the general population I could care less about being the mayor of McDonalds, finding a frisbee, collecting valueless influence points or any other intangible that the geek squad might think are fun. They have no value. None. As long as WIIFM = ZERO, critical mass adoption by the general population simply won’t occur. Why would it?

Just like I own my other information, I own my location. For me to share it with you, or the world, requires incentive. Incentive and time to build a new set of social behaviors. Continue reading “Location, location, location? Sure, but WIIFM?” »

Many of you have read or seen the interviews I did about the Chile earthquake. I thought I’d tell you in my words what happened and then I’d like to share some thoughts on what social media really is from my perspective.

Saturday, February 27th, 2010 I awoke and got a cup of coffee. It’s the first thing on my agenda after a quick stop at the washroom. I had a few slurps and then went to the office to get phones. This is a common routine for Ken and I. Coffee then phones.

After getting phones, I look to see how many emails and messages there are, clearing them from my phone as I go. Then I typically open tweetdeck. Tweetdeck is the twitter client I use most often on my iphone. Once I have looked at twitter I head to facebook, because while I have a facebook app on my phone it doesn’t show me my pokes and my goal as a rule is to clear up anything that is an action item. Pokes are action items.

Saturday began like any other day, but I got stuck at tweetdeck. Both Ken and I noticed a number of tweets regarding an earthquake in Chile. My brother’s wife is there so our ears perked. We started searching google for news, looking at trending topics on twitter and in general seeking any information about the status of the people in Chile.

Once we saw the magnitude of the earthquake, 8.8 is HUGE, we started wondering if we should contact my brother to find out if he heard anything. I decided to attempt to call Chile to see if maybe all was ok in Santiago, which is where Maria was, and of course couldn’t get through. Call failed. Call failed many times and by now I was getting nervous. I looked at Ken and asked if he thought I should call my brother. We agreed I should.

I woke my brother up from a sound sleep to give him horrible news. An earthquake had occurred and we had tried to reach his wife and couldn’t get through. He said he would start trying. He was so distraught! There is nothing like having to share with a family member bad news. Really bad news. My heart went out to him but I believed it was better he know what happened than to wake and hear it elsewhere.

My brother and I quickly got off the phone with each other so he could start his long vigil while trying to find out what had happened to Maria. In the meantime, I too went to work to see if I could find some answers.

I can’t tell you how often I have been asked what hashtags are and how to use them. I have certainly used them for basic searches before this, but they became a lifeline.

Quickie def. of hashtags: A hashtag uses the hash symbol [pound sign] on your keyboard to draw attention to a specific topic or word.

When I was looking at the trending topics I quickly saw patterns. #Chile was big, #chileearthquake was too. #terremotochile was the biggest one at the beginning of my search so there I went, to http://search.twitter.com/search?q=terremotochile
I noticed a lot of people had many other hashtags so back on twitter I started posting random tweets, at first with no hashtags, moving to hashtags.

I honed my tweets and eventually started getting responses from people until the final response that really was a game changer for us. This one, from @jpcoderch:

We soon worked out the details and he went to work in Chile trying to call my sister in law. It took approximately two hours until he finally got through to her. Maria sent a message back with the code word twinkie, a pet name she uses for my brother so we would know it was really her.

The rest is really history. The interviews I did with the BBC as well as CBS Miami and even the conversation I had with a person from MSNBC which led to a story on their blog, that’s all easy enough to discover and share and it has been shared enough that I do not feel compelled to again.

What hasn’t really been talked about, though each of the news stations attempted to put their own spin on it, is the value in social media. I’m not talking about the communication potential or the way we might all find our next job, but the life altering value I have personally experienced. It also changed perceptions for me.

Prior to this incident, I had relationships with a few fairly well known web-celebs. Do you know only a handful of our moderately well known friends communicated any interest in what was happening or offered on any level to put the word out, and none of them, unless pointed to our situation offered support of any sort? Does this surprise you? I was not surprised, but it did give me pause to consider who we align ourselves with and what value are they in our lives if when something that really matters happens they aren’t even be in the audience as silent support. How engaged is that? I’ll save that for a later post.

Is social media important? Yes. Is it really important? Yes! Social media empowers it’s users to find their own information, to seek out people and ideas to enhance their lives, and provides opportunity to gain perspective. Prior to now, we were fed our ideals, socialized by big media, and brainwashed into believing all was as we were told. The innovators of the world didn’t buy into it and created tools that we can all use today to find what the real truth is. It is also much more as our story clearly demonstrates. It is an organic connection to the whole planet that allows us to see there is more than just us.

My thoughts have been building. I am in the process of writing a much more detailed post about engagement and social web celebs. For now, let me just say thank you to all who helped us and encouraged us through an incredibly trying and frightening time. We were very lucky to have the tools we have to be able to get to a result that was ultimately a gift. We found our family member alive and safe.

We hope all whose paths crossed ours during the awful Chile earthquake have had the kind of outcome we had, and for those who did not – our hearts grieve with you for all you have lost.

Technorati Tags: #terremotochile, #Chile, #earthquake

Social media = ROTC or Return on Trust & Credibility. I grabbed that from friend, Shashi Bellamkonda and think it incredibly compelling. One of the things we all look for when trying to understand the value of social media is a way to define it so it makes sense en masse. In attempting to define the ROI it gets a little sticky because there are so many different sets of analytics and no one can agree on a standard. For more on my thoughts on that here is an article I recently wrote for Women Grow Business in Washington DC – Replacing ROI’s Old Monetary Vision.

Last night I was pointed to a great article that actually helps remove some of the mystery around social media and the value it has in the world we live in today. One of the biggest indicators is that social media investment is minor if anything at all, and your return is potentially huge. I’m sharing from the article but I hope you’ll go and read it in it’s entirety.

The SBSI found that nearly one out of five small business owners are actively using social media in their business. Small businesses are increasingly investing in social media applications including blogs, Facebook® and LinkedIn® profiles.

And further to that is this next paragraph by small business owner Dr. Alan Glazier.

“In order to meet the growing challenges of a tough market last year, I was forced to consider alternative options to keep my business visible,” says small business owner Dr. Alan Glazier, CEO and Founder, Shady Grove Eye and Vision Care. “With a very small investment in social media marketing, I was able to generate new business opportunities. Our Google® ranking is consistently number one for many of the phrases people use to search for eye doctors in and around my city and we have received a “bump” in terms of new visitors to the site. My blog has been picked up by different news sources and led to media interviews. I am now recognized as a thought leader in social networking within my profession and lastly but most importantly, my marketing budget has been reduced by more than 80%.”

Let me just reiterate, the cost of social media is minimal. As stated above, Dr. Glazier lowered his marketing cost by 80%. What could your company do with that 80%?

Of course, it’s not enough to simply create a presence in the online world of marketing venues. People want to have a relationship with those they hire. I would caution you that engagement must be a part of your marketing campaign. Broadcast messages will not build a customer base. You must use tools, video, audio, and messaging systems to encourage a relationship.

Today, small business is winning. It’s winning because they are resourceful and far more attuned to their clients. During an economic downturn such as we have been experiencing for the past 18 + months, small business success is a key indicator of the value in social media.

Yesterday Ken wrote here on stardust three key factors to success. Adapt, Adopt, Adjust. This should be every small business’ mantra. Social media must be included in that.

Remember, Social media = ROTC or Return on Trust & Credibility. We build our trust through social communication. Credibility will follow with engagement.

Let me just get right to it. We would like to introduce my nephew, Brandon Rochelle as a new writer here at Stardust Global Ventures.

A little background on Brandon from his ‘aunties’ perspective.
Brandon is practically a digital native. He has virtually always had a computer at his disposal, has been taking them apart, putting them back together and basically learning them from the inside out since he was little boy. Brandon was there, already online when I had my first connected experience. He showed me the ropes of some of the gaming sites back in the mid 90′s, and he was there to help when I needed a hand. The only time Brandon wasn’t completely entrenched in computer life, and even then not really, was during his stint in the army when he was working on Chinook helicopters in Iraq.

Brandon is a Technical Architect focused on creating physical and logical network infrastructure.

His specialties include: Java Programming, Visual Editing/Creating, HTML, JavaScript, JSP, Computer Management/Repair, Resource Management, adherence to Policies and Procedures, SOA.

He’s currently working on some research around high performance and high bandwidth and next generation applications. Brandon is working with several groups in the Pendelton, OR community to encourage Google to bring their next generation high capacity fiber to the area. He’s not talking about what we can currently do better, but what we can start doing that is an “Out of the Box” thought. Things such as Tele-visits for doctors and patients. Or distance learning for home-schooled or even foreign exchange systems. He’s also interested in simulated virtual environments for 3D conferencing across different locales.

You can find Brandon online at
Twitter , Google, LinkedIn

Something to keep in mind when reading this, I didn’t do a technical review. If you want that, you’ll have to wait for Ken to write something. These are personal experiences and feelings from a pseudo geek.

You’re probably aware of the queries both Ken and I have thrown out about iPhone stuff. We’ve been such strong proponents of RIM, I’m pretty sure most of you can’t fathom us switching sides. We didn’t, at least not exactly.

We got iPhones.

I know, that’s got to be the big shock of the year. So how come I said we didn’t switch sides? To switch sides implies we are no longer rooting for the other team, and no longer view them as quality and that simply isn’t the case.

We took a little road trip this last weekend and our friend Dameon, aka @phoneboy called while we were in transit. Something I thought about while talking to Dameon was how much I still loved my Blackberry. My Blackberry Bold found a new home with my son who swears it’s the best phone ever – that coming off the Nokia 5800 Xpressmusic phone which we loaned him a year ago and he LOVED.

What I loved about my Blackberry.

Both the Blackberry curve and bold are impressive devices. They thread messages wonderfully, their messaging service works almost flawlessly, to send both text and mms is super simple, and the apps for basics like twitter and facebook work better than their native platforms work most of the time.

I also loved typing on Blackberry. Typing on a qwerty keyboard is so much easier than a non qwerty, and when I say that I mean it beats hands down my use of the iPhone. If I had to say one thing would make me think twice again it would be that feature, or lack of a feature that could cause me to rethink.

The Blackberry messenger service was incredible. The iPhone may have over 100k apps but nothing I have found touches what Blackberry messenger could do, from basic messaging, one on one, to group messages, as well as file and picture transfers I simply don’t see anything in iPhone that comes close.

Multi tasking is yet another feature the Blackberry does well. With the Bold I was able to have multiple applications running at the same time, and did. I could have a call up, apps running, all while web browsing, something I’ll talk about later.

There are a few apps on the Blackberry that I miss but the truth is, if I were to shift back to that device I would miss some apps from the iPhone. Still, worth a real mention here is an app that I used in beta called socialscope. There has not been another mobile app that remotely functions the way socialscope does. That one app is a struggle and why it took me a while to buy the tweetie app on iPhone, something I wish I hadn’t purchased because I don’t find it better than anything else on iPhone that’s free. I remember hearing how fabulous it is and all I can say is, those who said that never had socialscope. ‘Nuff said.

Now web browsing. If all you’ve ever had is basic browsing like those non-smart phones offer, the Blackberry browser wouldn’t seem bad at all. I know because that is all I ever had pre Blackberry. However, once you have experienced other types of browsing you quickly see that RIM has a lot of catching up to do in order to provide a comparable experience. I’m not sure they can, actually. It’s unfortunate because so many things about the blackberry are actually superior to the iPhone. The appstore and browser make all the difference in the world. So let’s talk about that.

Experiencing the iPhone.

Many of you know that about a year ago Ken and I both got an ipod touch. Why that matters is because getting an iphone meant we already had a clue how to use it. Using the iPhone isn’t quite like using other phones or pda’s. It simply behaves differently, has a unique interface, which ultimately anyone can use because you don’t have to tell someone what to do to use it, it’s incredibly intuitive. It functions and works so easily and that is one of the great things about it.

We spent a year using ipods yet were pretty hesitant to get an iphone. There wasn’t any one straw that broke this camels back, it was many things.

First, while we don’t much care for the typing experience on iphone, something I’m sure we will eventually not have is a keyboard. Certainly not in the way we have them in current iteration of computer systems. I think touch, and ultimately voice will be our interface. We both think it likely.

Second, we are growing more and more mobile. Down sizing if you will. We want a device we can use in more ways than just to text or im and talk on the phone. Certainly I was able to watch youtube on my Blackberry, but if you put the Blackberry screen next to the iphone screen you can quickly see that there’s much better ability to see things on the iphone. I don’t have to squint as much and that is a big deal as I rarely have my glasses. Ken wears bifocals which also makes the iphone much more user friendly!

Third, the browser. There is not enough white space to talk about how brilliant the browsing experience is on the iphone. I LOVE the browser so much! It is the BEST browser on any mobile device I have ever used, and I have used several. I like that you in essence get tabbed browsing, and so far I haven’t found a limit to the number of windows I can open.

I love the ability to both pinch the screen to make it smaller or bigger, depending on need. The way I can scroll so seamlessly across a page not optimized for mobile browsers.

I don’t like the way my messages are threaded in the message box. It has made it impossible to respond to pokes much of the time. If I get a poke from someone and immediately following get a message, the message can be addressed, the poke can not.

I also don’t like that I literally have 3 different inboxes for mail. They all fall in the mail section but are separated there into 3 different boxes. It is more tedious and  I don’t care for it but it’s certainly doable.

The appstore, that’s incredible. If you’ve tried to use an appstore for any other platform you can appreciate a simple click and install process and how nice that would be. Blackberry appstore would like to be good but it isn’t. It’s a real pain.

Itunes on the other hand makes everything awful. I do NOT like itunes. Now, I will grant you that maybe I don’t use it to it’s best advantage, so that could be user failure. But many people I talk to despise the itunes interface and I wish it wasn’t so annoyingly cluttered, or processor intensive. I also wish there were better directions for how to prevent your non DRM’d media from becoming owned by itunes. I know how to do it should I need to, but it is a non-intuitive process. Funny how all the rest of the things about the iphone just work on an intuitive basis but not itunes. Not sure what happened there but someone clearly dropped the ball.

The sum of the total…

I wish I could tell you all that I wouldn’t change back, but that wouldn’t be fair. I probably would in the right circumstances. But for now, I’m an iPhone user and it’s not that bad. It’s not perfect, but I’m still learning. I’m sure I’ll have more to say as time goes by. I’ve only had it for a couple of weeks and I have a lot to learn.

Like many other people I sat on my sofa watching as patiently as possible for what was coming for Apple. Having recently switched to an iphone from a Blackberry, I had high hopes and great expectations. And I also made the assumption that many others did that there would be a tablet on their horizon. I wasn’t wrong but that wasn’t the big deal. Not in my opinion.

140,000 apps at your fingertips. From day one.

Right now, iPad can run almost 140,000 of the apps on the App Store. It can even run the apps you’ve already downloaded for your iPhone or iPod touch. Learn more

That is certainly a big deal. It’s super cool, and I’m probably more aware of how cool it is having used my new iphone for a couple weeks. But that’s just the beginning. The new iPad Also has the ability to dock to a keyboard. If you haven’t paid attention to me ranting about this in the last year, you won’t know one of the big reasons we didn’t choose an iphone sooner was no physical keyboard. I do miss it and this makes me really happy. Productivity will begreatly enhanced with this.

Watch out Kindle!

Another game changer from my perspective is iBooks. A beautiful, easy to use virtual bookshelf, the book reader and bookstore ‘just works’. Kindle over priced themselves, making their devices more expensive than many netbooks, and consequently their lack of extra abilities will make it impossible to compete with this new device. It’s unfortunate that they will be collateral damage but they will and so will all other book devices.

Unlimited 3G Data? YES!

If I had to pick a single part of the Steve Jobs News Cast this morning that really turned our world upside down, it has to be the 3G data plan for $30 a month, no contract, cancel anytime! I won’t repeat it but do think this will change the future landscape of mobile computing because this one statement invites competition that we haven’t seen for a long time. Competition will be good for our pocketbooks.

Now you’ve seen some of the neat pictures, I’d like to ramble for just a minute. I love this device. This is a device that in my mind is just about the coolest thing I’ve seen, since the pc. I was practically drooling, largely because I see how much this will change the future, our future.

Of course with the good comes the bad, and I would be remiss if I didn’t mention a couple of things that are lacking or outright missing. There is no camera. You can’t do video. You can watch it but no creation. Also, the storage ability, or lack there of makes it impossible to make this a primary computing device.

All of that said, the iPad has so much potential for putting something that was typically a tool associated with mac centric geeks in the hands of everybody. It will force us to change our computing behavior thereby creating acceptance of new ideas to further enhance our lives.

I’m so excited!

Technorati Tags: iPad, Apple, Steve Jobs, Kindle

My 2 cents, for what it’s worth. I don’t get all this hub bub about how scary it is to share your location with the world. We used to put our addresses in the phone book. OH NO! Who hasn’t been ‘stalked’?

Just today I saw no less than 4 posts about the geolocation craze. I’m in it and loving it. My favorite quote comes from Euan Semple.

Euan wrote:

I am always surprised when people write as if they were victims of technology rather than in control of it – I guess it is a bit like email!

Why do I like this? It points out that with technology we have more choices and more options to control what we take in, or to better filter things. Expecting everyone else to accommodate us is a little arrogant. Certainly we should try not to be too disruptive, but we really do need to better handle what we take in and stop expecting others to handle it for us. Filters are a key component to our sanity in a world where we are inundated with too many choices and too much noise.

Just a little piece of my mind. I won’t be leaving too many lying around. I need them.

Technorati Tags: geononymity, sheryl breuker, filters